The Railway Children.

with fine provenance

A very good example of this increasingly rare and ever-popular children's classic, immortalised by the 1970 film directed by Lionel Jeffries and staring Jenny Agutter, Bernard Cribbins and Dinah Sheridan.

On his return from filming Chitty, Chitty, Bang, Bang, and without anything else to read, Lionel Jeffries borrowed his 13 year old daughter's copy of The Railway Children and said of the experience; 'I found the climate of the... story just right for me, a way in which to start entertaining people and help not destroy our industry. There are hardly any films being made for children and for middle-aged and older age groups. I thought this could be one'. He bought a six-month option on the film rights for £300 and wrote the screenplay. 'I've kept to the story, it would be an imposition not to – after all, E. Nesbit's survived 50 years'.

First edition; 8vo (210 x 155); half-title, pictorial title and 20 black & white plates including frontispiece by C. E. Brock, 10pp publisher's adverts at rear, slight age-toning, as usual, some marginal spotting, and minor finger-soiling, more evident to pp 274 -275, short, closed fore-margin tear to title-page, not affecting text, otherwise very good; publisher's gilt-blocked maroon cloth, top edge gilt, remainder untrimmed, rubbing to extremities and darkening to spine, a little bubbling to top and lower edge of upper board, some dulling to gilt, otherwise a very good-plus copy.